The Last Secret You'll Ever Keep by Laurie Stolarz (summer reads txt) 📕

because they don’t want to hear anything different. Yes, everything’s great, tra la la.

Cobra-head43: Same here. My parents look at me like I might spontaneously combust, like at any second I’m going to come apart. When anything bad happens, they don’t share it with me because they don’t think I can handle it.

TulipPrincess: At least your parents care about you. All my mother cares about is payback. She’s on a mission to take down the guy who screwed with me, a.k.a. her ex-boyfriend.

Paylee22: Go, TulipPrincess’s mom!

TulipPrincess: Not really. I wish she’d care as much about me as she does about payback. I almost feel more alone now than I did when all that stuff was happening. How screwed up is that?!

Cobra-head43: I’m really sorry.:(

NightTerra: Yeah, me too.

TulipPrincess: I think this is her way of getting over the guilt she feels about bringing that scumbag into our lives and ignoring the signs that something messed up was going on. In other words, it’s all about her—still, after everything. Her, her, her …

Darwin12 has entered the chat room.

LuluLeopard has left the chat room. There are currently 7 people in the chat room.

JA Admin: Welcome, Darwin12. Remember the rules: no judgments, no swearing, no inappropriate remarks. This is a safe space for honesty and support.

A message from Peyton pops up on my screen. Private chat? She and I have been using the private chat feature quite a bit. For one, they’re a lot less monitored. For another, not everyone wants to spill their guts in an open forum. We’ve hinted once or twice about going “off-site” to chat or FaceTime, but the Jane Anonymous administrators have a strict policy that forbids the swapping of personal information (aside from first names), stressing the layer of protection provided when chatting exclusively through a website.

Are you still there??? Peyton asks.

I type back Yes and click the private link she’s sent.

NightTerra: Hey, I’m here.

Paylee22: I’m seriously about to lose it.

NightTerra: Why? What’s going on?

Paylee22: I’ve already taken a dose of my just-in-case meds and eaten an entire box of Swiss Rolls.

NightTerra:???

Paylee22: I went out earlier.

NightTerra: But that’s a good thing, right? Getting out of the house … Isn’t that what you want?

Paylee22: What I want is to be able to go to a store and not end up with a full-on panic attack because of it.

NightTerra: Tell me what happened.

Paylee22: I needed more contact solution and my mom refused to get it for me. She gave me the whole tough-love routine: “Baby steps, Peyton. A trip to the store. It’s only two blocks over. I’ll even walk a block behind you if it makes you feel more confident blah, blah…”

Paylee22: Anyway, I went to the store myself. And I felt like someone was following me the whole time. I kept seeing a patch of dark blue fabric out of the corner of my eye, like part of someone’s jacket.

Paylee22: I ended up leaving, without buying anything, then had a panic attack outside, on the sidewalk.

Paylee22: I seriously feel like he’s going to come back for me, like he’s waiting for just the right moment, when I least expect it.

NightTerra: Wait. Slow down. Perspective, remember?

NightTerra: Were you at a pharmacy? Because those places usually have way too many mirrors, which means way too many reflected images.

Paylee22: Yes, a pharmacy.

Paylee22: For real? Do you think that could be it?

Paylee22: Omg, maybe you’re right.

NightTerra: Deep breath.

Paylee22: I’m being completely paranoid, aren’t I?

NightTerra: I can relate to that. How do you think I know about reflected images in a pharmacy? #BeenThereDoneThat

Paylee22: Damned triggers, right?

NightTerra: An understatement.

Paylee22: Thank you, once again, for talking me off the ledge.

Paylee22: I can’t share this stuff with my parents. It hurts them too much. They just want me to be better. I can’t really blame them tho. I’d want me to be better too.

NightTerra: You’ll get there.

Paylee22: I try to look at things from their perspective. Parents who lost their son earlier than anyone ever should and then whose daughter went missing just eight months ago …

Paylee22: A couple that stays together, probably because of me, because I’m still living in their house and they don’t want me to have to endure any more change …

Paylee22: And then I think … Who am I to complain about drugstore visits or having to come out of my room?

NightTerra: You can complain all you want to me.

Paylee22: And that, my friend, means more to me than you’ll probably ever know. xo

NightTerra: xoxo

NightTerra: Has anyone ever doubted what happened to you?

Paylee22: That I was taken, you mean?

NightTerra: Yeah.

Paylee22: Who would ever make that kind of thing up?!

Paylee22: Plus, everyone knew I was telling the truth. For one, because I’m not a liar.

Paylee22: For another, because they found the shed where I was being kept. It’d been dismantled by the time the investigators uncovered it, but still …

NightTerra: Did they find any clues?

Paylee22: Nothing that went anywhere and all leads fizzled out.

NightTerra: After how much time?

Paylee22: Just a couple of months, which almost felt as bad as getting taken. Now that I’m back home, with no physical scars, it’s as if the crime no longer matters.

Paylee22: Why do you ask? Do people doubt your story?

NightTerra: Pretty much everyone does. For all the reasons you said. I returned home, physically unscathed—for the most part, anyway. There wasn’t much proof.

Paylee22: Except your word!!

NightTerra: My word doesn’t hold much weight. The people close to me think I’m pretty messed up.

Paylee22: Which is obviously why you’re always asking about your mental stability … All is beginning to make sense now. #TerraMysterySolved

Paylee22: Does your aunt believe you, at least?

NightTerra: She did at first but not anymore.

NightTerra: Things would be so different if my parents were still here.

Paylee22: I know. I’m sorry.:(

Paylee22: Sometimes I wonder how you even deal.

NightTerra: Obviously, not well.

NightTerra: Remember how you said before that when you were held captive it felt like your brother was there with you somehow—his spirit, that is?

Paylee22: Yeah …

NightTerra: I feel like that with my father too, that he visits me in my dreams.

Paylee22: I